Weekend box office looks incredible for Hunger Games.
After a huge take of over $19.7 million from Thursday night midnight showings alone, Lionsgate's winning Hunger Games added another $48.5 million on Friday, turning the day's total cume to over $68.2 million. Most impressive.
This is now Lionsgate's sixth highest grossing film ever after just one day, but wait for Saturday and Sunday and you're likely to see it almost make $150 million come weekend box office estimates.
This is the biggest March opening ever and also the largest for a film which isn't a sequel.
Gary Ross directs, as well as adapting the script with novel writer Suzanne Collins
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Not everyone loves "The Hunger Games." For Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson and Elizabeth Banks, that might seem like a problem, but Banks is here to set the record straight.
"[People ask] 'Are you worried about the haters, these people that don't like us?'" Banks said during Moviefone's special "Hunger Games" unscripted session. "I feel like all of us have to be like, 'We committed.' Suzanne Collins wrote the book, and she's happy. So we're happy."
Or as Josh Hutcherson responded: "Haters gonna hate."
Watch the clip above to find out more -- including what Banks thought when she was cast as Effie Trinkett -- and head here for all things "Hunger Games."
Photos:
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The Capitol would've had no problem finding Tributes for the "Hunger Games" last night.

Fans flocked to over 2,000 sold out theaters to root for Katniss Everdeen and experience the big screen adaptation of the Suzanne Collins' novel. And of course, they came decked out in their truest fanatic fashion form. Girls on Fire and Boys with Bread joined the lines to get a first glimpse of the film when the clock struck midnight. Handmade memorabilia and detailed scene costumes also grabbed the attention of those in line and passersby.

Even stars of the film took part in the cultural phenomenon. Amandla Stenberg (Rue) tweeted a picture with her friends while they waited for the show to start.

Check out our gallery of Tributes and Capitol citizens dressed to the nines for the midnight showings.
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We never really learn what catastrophic event occurred that led to the restructuring of North America into Panem, the post apocalyptic continent that is the setting for Suzanne Collins‘ Hunger Games trilogy. For that matter we aren’t really that certain what Panem looks like, and only have a vague idea of how the nation is set up.

If you’re anything like me and like a bit of cartography with your scifi/fantasy, Hunger Games fans and livejournalers aimmyarrowshigh and badguys got together and created a pretty cool map of Panem. Check it out below along with a legend that explains everything. And if you’re curious to see how they hammered this out you can check out the blog post that details the creation process here. Happy Hunger Games, everyone!

For my money, “The Host” is an even better novel than “Twilight.” But the important thing here is author Stephenie Meyer’s money–and she managed to turn both books into huge bestsellers.

The teaser trailer for the film adaptation of “The Host” has hit the web, just in time to remind “Hunger Games” fans that Suzanne Collins isn’t the only author whose blockbuster books are hitting the big screen.

While “Twilight” was a platform for a teen-oriented supernatural love story,
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Josh Hutcherson has said that he "fell in love" with his Hunger Games character Peeta. In an interview with MTV News, Hutcherson revealed that he was immediately taken with Peeta and that the role resonated with the type of person he is. He said: "For me, Peeta is an amazing character. I fell in love with him right away. What's crazy is that I've never seen a character that's so much of who I am as a person. "I just feel like his self-deprecating humour, his outlook on life, how he doesn't want things to change him - that's really part of who I am as a person. The actor, who won the lead role in the on-screen version of Suzanne Collins's dystopian trilogy alongside Jennifer Lawrence and Liam Hemsworth, said that it was important to remain unaffected by fame. "Being in this movie business (more)
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"Hunger Games" fans may have their own elaborate theories about Panem -- the from-the-ashes nation of Suzanne Collins's dystopian novels -- but it turns out the cast has a few thoughts of their own.
So Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson and Elizabeth Banks did a little arm chair detective work during in Moviefone's latest Unscripted. Hutch takes the lead in speculating exactly what happened to the states of yore.
Take a look at the clip above and be sure to keep abreast of our ever-unfurling "Hunger Games" coverage.
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Jennifer Lawrence shakes "like a Chihuahua" during interviews. The 21-year-old 'Hunger Games' star admits she gets so nervous on the red carpet that by the time she gets to the interviews, she doesn't know what to do with herself. She said: "Out of the four premieres, I've tripped in two or three of them. Like, massive trips. "It's so scary and then I end up getting so nervous that I get really hyper. So then I go do interviews and I'm like, 'I'm like a Chihuahua. I'm shaking. I'm peeing!' And then afterwards I'm like, 'I just talked about peeing on the red carpet!'" Despite having been cast as heroine Katniss Evergreen in the film adaptation of Suzanne Collins' book trilogy, Jennifer still doesn't believe she was the right woman for the job. Appearing on 'The Late Show with David Letterman', she said: "I am a troll.
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Jennifer Lawrence shakes 'like a Chihuahua' during interviews. The 21-year-old 'Hunger Games' star admits she gets so nervous on the red carpet that by the time she gets to the interviews, she doesn't know what to do with herself. She said: 'Out of the four premieres, I've tripped in two or three of them. Like, massive trips. 'It's so scary and then I end up getting so nervous that I get really hyper. So then I go do interviews and I'm like, 'I'm like a Chihuahua. I'm shaking. I'm peeing!' And then afterwards I'm like, 'I just talked about peeing on the red carpet!'' Despite having been cast as heroine Katniss Evergreen in the film adaptation of Suzanne Collins'
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A pre-title scroll, set to a classical thundering score, quickly establishes what seems to be a dystopian alternate-universe-Japan. The nation collapsed leaving 15 percent unemployed and 800,000 students boycotting school. The government passed something called the Millennium Educational Reform Act, which apparently provides for a class of ninth-graders to be chosen each year and pitted against one another on a remote island for three days. Each student is given a bag with a randomly selected weapon and a few rations of food and water and sent off to kill each other in a no-holds-barred game to the death. With 48 contestants, only one will go home alive. Yes, this has been often noted as the “original Hunger Games”; whether or not the author of that series (Suzanne Collins) borrowed heavily from Kinji Fukasaku’s near masterpiece or the novel by Koushun Takami
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.The Hunger Games. is being described as the next .Harry Potter. and .Twilight. because of its massive fan base stemming from its literary origin. Many fans of the Suzanne Collins book could not wait to see the film.

Prior to watching the movie, I did not understand the hype surrounding .The Hunger Games.. But after spending nearly 2 ½ hours with Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence), I can now tell you that I.m a believer. .The Hunger Games. is truly the first blockbuster movie of 2012 that has surpassed my expectations.

Kudos must be given to Lawrence who successfully embodies the female protagonist of the movie and to writer/director Gary Ross for infusing the film with enough heft and style. The result is an entertaining vision of a dystopian future.

What was once North America is now known as Panem, a nation of twelve districts and a controlling Capitol. Katniss and her
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Jennifer Lawrence's 'Hunger Games' hair cost £18,000. The 21-year-old actress went from blonde to brunette to play heroine Katniss Everdeen in the new movie, but had wigs of various shades of brown brought in as she was reportedly reluctant to let stylists experiment with her actual hair. Linda Flowers, Head Hair Designer for film - which is based on Suzanne Collins' book trilogy - told BellaSugar: 'I rented £18,000 of hair of all different shades of brown, from light brown to brown with a little bit of red in it. 'It made Jennifer comfortable that we weren't going to experiment with her colour.' Once the final colour was selected, Jennifer then allowed her hair to
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Jennifer Lawrence singlehandedly "carries" the 'Hunger Games' movie, according to producers. The 'Winter's Bone' actress stars as protagonist Katniss Everdeen in the movie which tells the story of teenagers in the future forced to compete to the death live on the TV for entertainment and producers Nina Jacobson and Jon Kilik say the movie is anchored by Jennifer's strong performance. Jon explained to The Hollywood Reporter: "To have [Katniss] be strong, and smart and independent. That's what we had to get right. [Jennifer Lawrence] just brought all that with her amazing talent and incredible work ethic. She just brought the best and carried us all on her back." The pair also have high praise for director Gary Ross, explaining they needed to find a filmmaker who shared author Suzanne Collins' "honest" voice. Nina said: "I felt that we needed to find a voice for the movie that was as honest
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Amazon announced today that The Hunger Games writer Suzanne Collins is the best-selling Kindle author of all time.
Photos: Behind the Scenes of THR's 'Hunger Games' Cover Shoot
The Ya series is set in a post-apocalyptic world where 24 teenagers -- one boy and one girl from each of 12 districts -- compete in a televised death match. The series focuses on Katniss Everdeen, a 16-year-old girl who volunteers to take the place of her younger sister in the competition. The much-anticipated movie version starring Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth opens March 23 in theaters.

This story originally appeared in the March 23 issue of The Hollywood Reporter.
Producer Nina Jacobson knows a thing or two about life in the arena. As president of the Buena Vista Motion Picture Group, she helped the first of the $3.7 billion-grossing Pirates of the Caribbean movies set sail in 2003, and soon after launching her own production company, Color Force, five years ago, she turned Jeff Kinney's Diary of a Wimpy Kid books into two modestly successful family films for Fox, with a third due in August. But with the film adaptation of Suzanne Collins' best-

Adaptations of young adult literature illustrate the divide between what we feel comfortable letting young audiences read about and what we feel comfortable letting them watch. Gus Van Sant’s excellent adaptation of Blake Nelson’s young adult novel, for instance, received an R rating due to a violent image, shutting out a lot of potential viewers before they even got a chance to see it. Suzanne Collins’ grisly, dystopian Hunger Games trilogy was always going to be a tough squeeze into the restrictions of the PG-13 rating, but it looks like Gary Ross found a way. U.K. viewers
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Taylor Swift's other "Hunger Games" track, "Eyes Open," has hit the 'Net nearly a week before the official soundtrack drops.

Whereas "Safe & Sound" is sparse and gloomy, Swift's second "Hunger Games" soundtrack contribution is more epic and upbeat, at least musically. The lyrics still touch on many of the darker themes of the film, meaning that she sings about the loss of innocence and the need to stay strong in the face of adversity.

"Yesterday we were just children/ Playing soldier just pretending/ Dreaming dreams with happy endings," she sings on the track, which has been posted on Perez Hilton's website. "In backyards, waging battles with the wooden swords/ But now we've stepped into a cruel world/ Where everybody stands and keeps score."

Josh Hutcherson has said that he admires his Hunger Games character Peeta Mellark's commitment to honesty. The Journey 2: The Mysterious Island actor revealed that his role in Suzanne Collins's young adult dystopian story was one that he immediately connected with on multiple levels. "Peeta is all about staying true to yourself. He goes into the Games and does everything he can to maintain what he believes in and not become just another pawn," Hutcherson explained in a new interview with Parade. "Growing up in the acting world, you have a lot of opportunities to change who you are and what you believe in based on how people treat you. I never wanted to do that. And that's what Peeta's driving toward through the series." However, Hutcherson went (more)
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Wes Bentley looks fit and happy; he's prone to laughter and slightly embarrassing admissions;such as the fact that he's been mistaken for Tobey Maguire so many times, he's even signed the other actor's autograph on occasion. It's good to see Bentley back on the big screen, his bright eyes full of mischievous glee as gamesmaker Seneca Crane in the hotly anticipated adaptation of Suzanne Collins' bestseller "The Hunger Games." After bursting onto the scene in 1999 as sensitive teen Ricky Fitts in "American Beauty," Bentley appeared to be the next big thing. Instead, he succumbed to a drug and alcohol addiction that left him broke and virtually unemployable.In 2009, Bentley got sober and began looking for work. His first stop was the New York theater community. "I went around to all the theaters and just said, 'Hey, look, I know there was a period of time when I was turning.
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